Tamiflu and Abnormal Behavior

It’s a particularly nasty flu season, right – what should we do??

Last week, a student in my daughter’s elementary school died. An apparently healthy, active, and vital 10-year old child suddenly departed. Despite an initial announcement of “cause unknown,” the administrators followed up with a suddenly clear pronouncement that he died “from the flu.” Looking beyond the fact that now even school administrators feel entitled to give clinical advice (“if you haven’t yet received your flu shot, please do”), I was interested to see that this child’s flu vaccine status was not mentioned. I wondered if he had received the flu shot or taken Tamiflu – especially since both have been associated with sudden death in the pediatric population.1

It’s a “deadly” flu season, and the pharmaceutically-funded media would have you believe that you must head on over to CVS and get your flu shot to make it through the year. And if the flu shot doesn’t work – even the CDC estimates its effectiveness around 39%2 – well then, just head to your doctor and get treated with Tamiflu!

But is it really that simple? Is it possible that we are bumping up against the glass ceiling of the Simple Solution for Sickness? Many of us are rolling our eyes at the “10% off your shopping order!” flu shot incentives, and our sniffles don’t send us running to the doctor for antibiotics “just in case.” As our own memories tell a different story from the scary stories on TV (wait…the chicken pox and the flu are deadly? Mom, Dad…didn’t you both have Measles and live to tell the tale?), we are becoming less and less susceptible to fabricated lore. We are harder to scare into action. We are beginning to accept that the magic pill is a fantasy, and that this crisis of confidence in our medical system is no small hurdle to overcome. It is an initiation into a new belief system.

I believe that this initiation begins with information and understanding. This understanding leads to informed choices. These empowered choices lead to a new experience of trust in your body and in the natural world.

Let’s bring this back to earth with an example. Let’s look at the Simple Solution for the flu: Tamiflu.

Conventional medicine tells us that you can pull one thread of the spider web without impacting the whole design. So, is it possible that Tamiflu can enter your system, kill those nasty flu germs, and quietly exit without harming any innocents?

What is Tamiflu, and how does it work?

Tamiflu (oseltamivir) is prescription medication that is FDA-approved for anyone 2 weeks of age and older.3 It is designed to prevent the influenza virus from replicating and invading other cells. The pharmaceutical company that developed Tamiflu, Roche (also called Hoffmann–LaRoche), claims that Tamiflu can protect against getting the flu and reduce the severity of flu symptoms. Roche cites studies like a 1999 article in JAMA, in which authors write that Tamiflu “…provided significant antiviral, biochemical, and clinical effects in experimental human influenza virus infection. Prophylactic administration either once or twice daily completely protected against viral recovery in the upper respiratory tract and against infection-associated respiratory tract illness.”4

Well that sounds good, right? In 1999, Roche presented this study, along with two clinical trials involving 1,358 patients,5 to an FDA committee of medical advisors – but the committee declined to approve Tamiflu due to a lack of convincing data.

Let’s dive a bit deeper to see if the data are indeed unconvincing (the full-text of this article is free!). This study involved 117 young adults (median age was 21), split into several groups that ranged from 11 to 64 subjects. Any scientist or statistician will immediately warn you that those group sizes (called sample sizes) are too small to draw statistically significant conclusions. With that in mind, let’s continue unpacking this study…

To measure the prophylactic effects of Tamiflu, researchers gave 12 people a placebo pill, and they gave 21 people various doses of Tamiflu before they stuck influenza virus into their noses. Flu-like symptoms were measured after viral inoculation, and people who had received Tamiflu were rated to exhibit lower symptom scores. From this experiment (based on a paltry 33 subjects), researchers concluded that Tamiflu indeed protects against getting the flu.

Next, to determine if Tamiflu reduced the severity of flu symptoms, researchers infected 80 people with the influenza virus (again in their noses). They gave Tamiflu to 56 people and a placebo to the rest. Then, researchers washed out people’s noses and measured the number of virus particles in their mucus. They reported that Tamiflu treatment reduced the number of viral copies in people’s nasal passages.

Quantifying the number of viral particles in people’s noses – after the flu virus was stuck into people’s noses – does not tell us anything about how the flu virus is spreading throughout the body. Anyway, for whatever reasons (you can use your imagination), FDA administrators overruled the medical expert committee’s suggestion and approved Tamiflu in October 1999.6 But the FDA hedged a bit and required the drugmaker to issue the following statement:

“Tamiflu has not been proven to have a positive impact on the potential consequences (such as hospitalizations, mortality, or economic impact) of seasonal, avian, or pandemic influenza.”7

Since its FDA approval, clinical trials touting the effectiveness of Tamiflu have been published – though a look at the authors and footnotes of these studies may give you pause. For example, Penelope Ward, MD has authored dozens of scientific studies that support Tamiflu,8 including the 1999 JAMA study we just deconstructed, a 2001 JAMA study with similar methods and conclusions,910 and an oft-cited 1999 study in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) entitled ‘Use of the Selective Oral Neuraminidase Inhibitor Oseltamivir to Prevent Influenza’ – and she served as the Head of Clinical Development for Hoffman-LaRoche.11 Actually, let’s look at the footnote of the 1999 NEJM study:12

Interesting…

Overall, it appears that all the studies that support the efficacy of Tamiflu are funded by the pharmaceutical companies that stand to profit from its sales.

Fortunately, a group of unbiased medical experts at the US Cochrane Center13 re-analyzed data from 20 clinical trials like these, reporting their results in a 2009 BMJ article. Their meta-analysis showed that there was no significant evidence that Tamiflu reduced influenza symptoms or complications – the only possible positive association was that Tamiflu might decrease the length of time people exhibited symptoms by a few hours.14 Further, the reanalysis found that Tamiflu increased nausea.

As an interesting aside, Cochrane Center researchers noted that it took years-long concerted efforts to obtain clinical data from drugmakers.15 Along these lines, investigative articles published in The Atlantic in 200916 and 201317 suggest that political and financial motivations (to the tune of billions of dollars) underpin this Tamiflu delusion.

So where does this leave us? Perhaps Tamiflu doesn’t work that well, but is there any harm in taking it anyway, just to be safe?

Is Tamiflu safe?

A 2007 scientific report18 suggests that Tamiflu is in fact exceedingly dangerous. In the 6 years that Tamiflu was marketed in Japan, the Japanese Ministry of Health Labour and Welfare received 1377 reports of adverse reactions. Approximately half of these reactions were serious neuropsychiatric cases, including delirium, convulsions, and encephalitis. Eighty deaths were reported, and 71 were considered to be directly related to Tamiflu. Two of the most alarming deaths were suicides by 14-year-old teens on Tamiflu.19

A 2011 Japanese study found that those diagnosed with influenza had an almost six fold increased risk of deteriorating and dying within twelve hours of receiving Tamiflu.20

They conclude:

“These data suggest Tamiflu use could induce sudden deterioration leading to death especially within 12 hours of prescription. These findings are consistent with sudden deaths observed in a series of animal toxicity studies, several reported case series and the results of prospective cohort studies. From “the precautionary principle” the potential harm of Tamiflu should be taken into account and further detailed studies should be conducted.”

As such, Japanese authorities have advised against Tamiflu for adolescents, and the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (the UK’s version of the FDA) recommends against Tamiflu as a preventative strategy in healthy people.21 Yet, American agencies like the CDC and FDA continue to push Tamiflu in spite of its documented side effects of hallucinations.22

Several recent news stories have highlighted these side effects of Tamiflu. For example, on January 15, 2018 a 6-year-old Texan girl took Tamiflu, hallucinated, and tried to jump out of a window23. About a week later, another Texan child, this time a two-year-old boy, suffered from hallucinations that caused him to repeatedly slap his mother.24

In a news article from January 24, 2018, the mother of a five-year-old girl who experienced severe hallucinations and seizure-like symptoms stated, “The flu is bad, it’s horrible, you feel helpless your child’s sick…I would take that a hundred times over the reaction she had to the Tamiflu.”25 Perhaps most telling is an article in Time entitled ‘Tamiflu Made My Kid Hallucinate. I Think the Flu is Preferable to Delirium.’26

Very sadly, a 6-year old girl named Emily Muth from North Carolina died this week – three days after being given Tamiflu.27 According to her mother, Emily suffered from labored breathing (a known side effect of Tamiflu) right before her tragic passing.

Emily Muth

Unfortunately, Tamiflu is neither safe nor effective. I hope that presenting the terrible experiences of the children and families mentioned in this article will serve as a warning to prevent more tragedies.

Fighting won’t win this fight

When you understand that the preschool analogy of foreign invaders (germs) fighting your inner soldiers (immune system) has been rendered obsolete by our awareness of the microbiome (including the virome!), and the poetic reality that we are made up of the very organisms we thought that we were fighting…well, then pharmaceutical medicine seems something like cutting off your nose to spite your face.

This is when you can graduate to a deeper sense that illness is purposeful, that the body recalibrates through fever, and that we are simply here to support the body’s innate wisdom…the less fear, the better.

There are many evidence-based tools for supporting your body’s detoxification process including vitamins A and D, herbs like ginseng, elderberry, and ginger, and food-derived compounds like AHCC and beta glucan, and, my favorite in this case, homeopathy (Oscillococcinum).28 Take the cue to stop, rest, and just be – while your body does its wise work.

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Kelly Brogan, MD

Kelly Brogan, M.D. is a Manhattan-based holistic women’s health psychiatrist, author of the New York Times bestselling book, A Mind of Your Own, and co-editor of the landmark textbook, Integrative Therapies for Depression. She completed her psychiatric training and fellowship at NYU Medical Center after graduating from Cornell University Medical College, and has a B.S. from MIT in Systems Neuroscience. View full bio.
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Comments

Thank you Kelly from the bottom of my heart. Once again you have produced for us all a well written and documented article citing similar symptoms and coming from a fact based common sense approach. Thus allowing us all to make decisions asked on our own health by being fully informed of all consequences and bringing what needs to be out into the light for all to see. You are a brave, intelligent and courageous woman and most of all compassionate in making a difference in peoples lives on a daily basis. Again thank you 🙏

Thank you Kelly. Although I don’t use or support either I did not know the side effects Tamiflu so thank you
I used to work at Boiron so I have been using oscillo for 20 years.
I loved you book and have incorporated a lot of that into my work.
I am an energy coach and digestive health professional.

Thank you for posting this, I made the choice 3 weeks ago to not put my kids on Tamiflu, they survived on Tylenol, elderberry, popcicles, juice, soup, and water.
It’s sad seeing your kids so sick, it’s worse seeing them Ill and having such tragic side effects

Thank you, Dr. Kelly Brogan! We are so indoctrinated to believe the pill will fix us, protect us, keep us well – without understanding the amazing power of our body to heal itself. As a health coach I am constantly asked about all things heath related and jaws drop when people learn that even “incurable” diseases can be healed with knowledge and appropriate lifestyle choices. Thank you for all you do!!!! Keep writing!!! Elaine

I keep Oscillococcinum in my home pharmacy. I’ve used it several times to stop what might have been the flu before it ever really launched. I just wish there was a similar product that worked for colds as I’m prone to getting one each winter that often turns into bronchitis. I’ve tried the one available from this brand and it does nothing.

No flu shots for me… ever (well, except one and I got sicker than I’ve ever been) and no Tamiflu.

Dr Brogan, this is still terrifying news. As parents, how do we keep our children safe? I’ve always been wary of the flu vaccine, but if I found myself in this situation with my 18 month old and 3 year old what should I do? How do I try and keep them safe? My 3 year old attends preschool 3 mornings a week so she is exposed to a lot of children.

I work as a hospitalist and I indeed feel like we are causing more harm than good with Tamiflu. We are causing hallucinations/delirium (especially in the geriatric population), which in turn, increases length of stay, which, in turn, increases risk of hospital acquired illnesses! And there is NO way that anyone would assign any early deaths to Tamiflu, (or God forbid, the flu vaccine) only to the “deadly” influenza virus.

Thanks for the info, Kelly. Both my sister and I are employees of hospitals in different states. She’s in direct patient care, I’m in the financial side of things. This was the first year her employer required a flu shot for all direct care employees (she’s an OR nurse), or they would be terminated. The hospital I work for has the flu shot requirement, but an opt out can be signed with a “I’ll wear a mask around patient areas” clause. My sister was deviated. We never get flu shots and never have our kids vaccinated either because they are not reliable and the risk of a reaction from the shot is scarier than the actual flu. She was going to take legal action agains the hospital, but couldn’t not afford attorney’s fees and also be unemployed at the same time. It’s awful that it has come to this. Thanks for keeping the information coming, I appreciate it so much.

Most people focus on the germs and ignore the strength and balance of the host/patient/person/themselves. If people spent half as much time focusing on balancing and strengthening their health they could ignore the germs and be twice as healthy.

I wish I could have seen this sooner. I had the flu at the beginning of January, and the doctor prescribed tamiflu for me and as a preventative for my four kids (ages 10 months- 8). I did not get the tamiflu for myself, but debated whether or not to do it for my kids. I really did not want them to get the flu. I finally decided to do it because two of my friends who are nurses made it sound like if I didn’t I was a bad mother for putting my kids, especially my baby, at risk. Thankfully, my children had no adverse side effects. I have a lot to learn about what should/should not be consumed. Thank you for your work and website. It is a great start for the journey of learning that I need to take for me and my family so that I can know for myself what is right instead of depending on the opinion of friends, doctors, family, etc.

Please anyine help! My 8yo was diagnosed with the flu of course i was nervous because of the severity in the news. He was presrcibe tamilflu but they didnt have pediatric meds in stock. We were told he can take on adult dose a day per his age and weight.

He had one dose and vomitted. I decided not to give him anymore. Thankfully he healed well. However 11 days later and i noticed his behavior is not the same. He is defiant at times and said he heard voices. This is completely out of character for him. I dont know what to think. I started reading up and found all these terrible side effects. Could this behavior be from that 1 dose still displaying 11 days later? And is this something that can be detoxed from a young child?

I am a NP in family practice so to say that I have seen my fair share of flu cases is an understatement. I sometimes use tamiflu and sometimes don’t. I appreciate your article but also want to point out that the flu also kills in many of the same ways that you mentioned tamiflu does. Labored breathing and possible hallucinations from high fevers are possible from just having the flu. I don’t push tamiflu in my practice and I do explain side effects but I also believe what is needed is education just about the flu. Is the vaccine perfect…. absolutely not. But we have seen other viruses eradicated because of vaccines so I do encourage them. Viruses will last 7-10 days and then be over. However patients feel helpless when they come in feeling so bad and you just give them something to treat symptoms. This is where my profession has failed. This should be the mainstay of treatment, not necessarily Tamiflu. Also, prevention is key. Why does flu come in the winter. Our bodies are comprised. We get little sunlight, we stay indoors without fresh air, and we eat processed foods that I believe decrease our ability to fight infection.
Thanks for the article. I agree tamiflu is not great, but in an country where instant gratification is always present and expected pressure to give something is also there. I also use oscillo but wish insurance would consider covering it.

Dr. Kelly – because of my deepest appreciation for all your advocacy for sane natural prevention and healing modalities – I’m going to work harder at education my neighbors through live events and food/smoothie demos.

It seems that this idea IS indeed spreading, but, dear friends, let’s pick up the pace and encourage people to take responsibility and GET OFF the #$@%&#! medical grid so that we can all enjoy a much healthier world and generations to come.

If we could rid the world of the HARMa mafia really soon – the would be the best! 🙂

Hi Kelly,
Thanks for the info on Tamiflu
I am here in Toronto and everyone, the media, the medical profession has this obsession with getting your annual flu shot” !!
What are your thoughts???
Thanks so much,
Bobbie

My daughter went into sudden cardiac death and was revived multiple times, while being life delighted to Boston children’s hospital, she was given tamiflu. 2 yrs ago , she now has long qt syndrome and has a defibrillator until she can get a new heart. She lives in constant pain, the device is too big for her body. No one see’s the pain she lives with, the tears, but without it she will die. Thanks a lot Tamiflu

Achy body, post nasal drip, coughs, can all result from a severe electrolyte imbalance which I have discovered can be triggered by swings in the weather.

I suspect abrupt changes in the barometric pressure during these weather swings cause the kidneys to release more potassium and sodium than they should. And when the levels of sodium and potassium both plummet, many people become sensitive/ temporarily allergic to things they normally wouldn’t react to.

To fix this, I use a herb called Gotu Kola to restore kidney balance and then make sure I add the electrolytes back. I usually know this is the cause if it comes with severely chapped, dried lips and a “breathing pool water” sensation in my nose.

Regarding the flu itself, there is one very important and useful herb missing from your list– YARROW.

Yarrow is filled with anti viral substances and I have seen just a cup or two if the tea reverse flu symptoms in an hour or two, or prevent it from developing at all when consumed early. It’s hard to find, but worth having in your pantry during the flu season.

I definitely see your point in this article. For us medicine is a last resort. We are both medically trained. So many things are more about rest so your body can fight and controlling the fever so it does not get too high for your child, especially since I have heat induced seizures with high fevers. I frequently give just enough tylenol to keep the fever lower and camomile tea with milk before bed. I mostly control the fever at night when it might interfere with rest. Keeping a close eye for other problems that suggest a need for antibiotics (that means hospital trip). For the most part my babies are treated at home and are healthier than most of their peers. Like me, when I was growing up, my oldest son gets a fever, goes to bed and wakes up all better. Never misses a day of except 3 when he just needed a little longer for the fever to go away. I only was very ill and had heat seizures when I was younger (2-4yrs). I had repeated ear infections and fevers over 102. Apparently my mom says that was the temp at which I would start seizing. They lost me briefly at 2 1/2yrs. They were able to revive me. I was under observation for several days to observe my fever induced seizures. They were apparently very curious why I seemed to start seizing at this specific temp almost on cue. Not sure if they ever came to any conclusions. My ears have continued to have ear aches and infections. My last major infection had me deaf in both ears for2 weeks. I wound up with a hole in my left ear drum and partial hearing loss.